2009 Le Mans 24 Hours Preview – LMP2 Part 1

12 cars, 5 different chassis and 5 different engines; variety is the key to the appeal here. Not that there won’t be pace – there certainly will be plenty of evidence of that with quick cars and quick drivers aplenty amongst the entry.

Will we see a race run on pace, will it come down to reliability, or perhaps we’ll have a runaway race from the Porsches with a second race behind?

Let’s hope not. Several teams have made great strides since 2008, and while the RS Spyder still has the legs, its advantage is not nearly as profound now.

So how do we split this down? Let’s do it by what’s bolted in the back for a change.

After well over half a decade where it was the LMP2 engine of choice, AER’s little 2 litre turbo dwells in just a single entry this year, the Bruichladdich Bruneau Radical SR9; the SR9 now in its fourth season of racing, a lifetime at this level.

After a very low-key 2008 though there seem to be signs of an Indian summer for Peterborough’s fastest car – strong finishes in both of the opening LMS races of the season (before a controversial post-race disqualification at Spa at least).

Pierre Bruneau and Marc Rostan are re-united aboard the #26 car - this pair having Championship winning form from the early days of the LMES when reliability was the key – and are joined by Tim Greaves. This trio will need to have a faultless run and for others to stumble if a podium is to be on the agenda.

Judd have long dominated the ‘garagiste’ market in LMP1, but their latest LMP2 spec V8 is now developing a tidy reputation for all the right reasons.

Two of Lola’s pretty coupes feature the Rugby screamer in the back and both could feature in the upper echelons of the class throughout.

First there’s the baby of the Speedy Garage Team Sebah team, now in its second season. 2008 saw a series of niggly reliability issues thwart this car getting onto terms with the trio of RS Spyders in the Le Mans Series. The speed of the package is undoubted and the Sebah team know exactly what it takes to win races; now they have to prove that they can take that experience up from GT2 to LMP2. An impressive driver line up, Benjamin Leuenberger, Jonny Kane and Xavier Pompidou will help enormously – a definite contender.

The second Lola Judd Coupe is the new kid on the block in some ways, a new car with a driving squad that has never competed together in an LMP before. That’s where the ‘newbie’ status ends though.

Racing Box are a team of quality, let down badly last year with the ludicrous Lucchini debacle but coming back punching hard with a two car Lola Judd campaign in the Le Mans Series. A 1-3 finish first time out at Barcelona was a heck of a start, but only a single accepted entry (possibly the smackdown result of Lucchinigate) and a Spa 1000kms that they’ll prefer to forget - one car losing rear bodywork at the start of the race and being forced to retire due to a lack of spares and the other falling foul of a post race disqualification after finishing on the road in a podium position.

The Le Mans driver squad could barely be more experienced. Thomas Biagi has 24 Hour race winning form, Matteo Bobbi too is an endurance racing veteran and Andrea Piccini. If the chemistry works on and off track they’ll be tough to beat.

The Zytek V8 trio come next with Ginetta Zytek entries for GAC Racing, and Barazi Epsilon with 07S chassis and Quifel ASM with a 09S.

Let’s start with the team that transferred loyalties from Lola. Quifel ASM have been contenders ever since they bought the ex-Chamberlain Synergy LMP2 Lola B05/40. It was an immediate winner and the team has shone ever since. Last season saw the ever present Miguel Amaral joined by the mercurial Olivier Pla and the change in the close season to the Ginetta Zytek was, in no small part, made on the fast Frenchman’s advice.

Guy Smith joins the squad for Le Mans for the second consecutive year and they start the meeting with very high ambitions. The car has the speed, the driving squad is equipped to compete too and, if the racing gods smile on the #40 car, this could be a real class contender.

GAC Racing is the new moniker for the squad running the Oijeh family-owned Ginetta Zytek run last season by an under achieving Trading Performance team.

Karim Oijeh and Claude Yves Gosselin made the smart choice of bolstering their attack with the appointment of Philip Peter; the Austrian immediately on the class pace. There’s passion aplenty here on display, but as a whole this won’t be the quickest LMP2 squad, or indeed the quickest Ginetta Zytek. That’s not always the recipe required for Le Mans success, but the era of the Porsche RS Spyder means it has become a more important part of the toolkit. We’d rate the chances of success for the #41 car as not definite, not even probable, but certainly possible.

Finally (in more ways than one as it turns out) there’s the #32 Barazi Epsilon Ginetta Zytek. Quite why the ACO put the 2006 LMS LMP2 Champions so far down the reserve list is open to speculation, but fear not followers of crazy Botswana-resident Danes, Juan Barazi and co have made it.

The #32 car is the same and the backroom boys are the same but Michael Vergers is gone; so too, for Le Mans at least, is Fernando Rees. Instead, we have 2008 Le Mans team man Stuart Moseley and Roland Berville. Moseley will duke it out with the best of them and the two ‘B’s won’t disgrace themselves on pace, but they won’t trouble the really fast boys either. Keep it on the island should be the watchword here.